What are you reading today?

[mitrac]

Does anyone have favorite German authors they would recommend or want to discuss?

I’ve finally finished reading all the German books around the house that we’ve accumulated (SO is German, we’re living in Germany), so I’m finally getting to the point where it makes sense to buy books again . Among those books we had, I didn’t find any gems, to be honest, so my next batch incoming is a classic Momo | L29 and a lighthearted fantasy Tintenwelt 1. Tintenherz: Der Auftakt der erfolgreichen Fantasy-Bestseller-Reihe | L22??. I’m looking forward to those! In an eclectic move, I also got two books about Schubert’s Lieder (yes, the turn of the 19th century composer Schubert), since recently I got totally hooked on his Winterreise Cycle and I’d quite like to better understand both the poems they’re based on and the music. (I linked to idagio, it’s an amazing German classical music streaming service, you can listen free if you make an account)

I’m having a hard time finding authors I like, or maybe the problem is, I haven’t tried hard enough.

Searching for a Neil Stephenson-like sci fi author - I liked one book by Andreas Eschbach but 2 others of his fell totally flat. I’d quite like to find something funny and lighthearted, but I’ve been disappointed by most of the German humor/fantasy authors I’ve tried out so far. If anyone has tips for who is a German equivalent for, say, Neil Gaiman, Jasper Fforde or Douglas Adams that would be interesting, but maybe it’s unfair to look in that way. I’ve tried short story collections and literary works, but ooof, classic German authors are quite heavy and in times like these, it’s too hard for me to stomach, reading German authors delving deeply into serious themes that billionaires today just belittle and make jokes about.

Here’s the kind of stuff I like from another thread. I’d be interested in hearing from the other German readers on here and trade some tips! For example, I’m finding Medimops very helpful for buying used books in the EU (and Momox for selling).

Summary

@mitrac

Fun topic!!! Like SpiderWeb says, for me it’s all about the story. A good story transcends everything and I don’t pay a lot of attention to genre. I have some likes and dislikes in most genres. That said I have noticed some patterns and reading more slowly in Japanese has made these preferences more obvious to me:

Favorite elements

• Cozy mystery - I enjoy something with great puzzle, mystery and novelty aspects, but safe in the knowledge that nothing in there will ruin my day (some things in my least favorites list below)
• Short stories - especially in a foreign language as it’s just so satisfying to finish something. I find it’s a great way to explore new authors and uncomfortable topics in bite size amounts. Or even a feel good story that might be too sweet for a full novel length can be more enjoyable as a short story.
• Adventure - I like themes of stretching limits and exploring.
• Biography - I just love peaking into other people’s lives. A well-written biography normally has a lot of elements I love in other genres - a life story is often a collection of short stories and adventure after all.
• Literary fiction - I mean the stories that just make me think about life and how it all works, and become more aware of and question my beliefs.
• Comedy / Humorous daily life stories - Just some innocent entertainment and laughs. Like the book version of Calvin and Hobbes - sign me up
• 癒やし系 - one of my favorite discoveries in Japanese. I’m not sure I’ve really approached this in prose, though, so far just in manga.

I’m neutral on Sci-Fi and Fantasy, it totally depends on the story for me.

Least favorite elements

• Crime - eek, I have a hard time stomaching violence as entertainment
• Revenge stories - if the writer is asking me to empathise with revenge I go into a tailspin on ethical philosophising and end up angry or in despair. Revenge that is more nuanced is ok if incidental or viewed objectively. There are some great books that include revenge thoughtfully. But most approaches to revenge follow social norms without examination, which includes quite a high tolerance to a certain amount of “justified” revenge violence. It’s quite a normal widespread human instinct but I want to live in a world where humanity grows up past that, and books handling revenge according to current norms remind me I am not in that world. Enter despair.
• Rough stuff - if the description needs blurred trigger warnings, it’s probably content I don’t want to dwell on. You can probably guess I’m not a fan of the Terrible people doing Terrible Things others have mentioned although I find it incredibly amusing that it’s a recognisable genre
• Horror - I have really vivid dreams, so although I found it entertaining as a kid, I value my sleep too much now
• Romance - not sure why, but I just get bored. If it’s incidental, fine. But if the whole point of the book/story is the romance, I check out.
• School setting - not something I would have mentioned except at the beginner level there is a lot of that in WK clubs and it holds little interest for me. As others have said, though, I do have some exceptions. But as a general rule it’s a - meh.